Arran produced zip ties. Shade gagged him without ceremony, his actions efficient and cold. Then he jabbed our prey’s neck with a needle, delivering a dose of unconsciousness the bastard didn’t deserve. At my feet, Harford struggled for the length of two breaths before he understood.
Good. Let him learn powerlessness.
We hauled him up and moved fast, keeping him between us. We hit the hall.
A figure stood at the far end.
Slim, paper-white, and wrapped in a silk dress, Denise Harford held the banister, her face composed. Not a woman woken in panic.
Her gaze snapped to her husband then to us. Her lips thinned.
I went still.
Not from fear, but from ice-cold fury.
That elegant mask. That cultivated calm. The woman Dixie had described with disbelief, because the world would never imagine that kind of person as evil.
Denise stared right back. Took in my posture. My mask. The way I stood between her and her husband.
But not the grip Arran had on the back of my jacket.
“Put him down,” she said softly.
“No,” I answered.
I held that ice queen’s gaze and let every promise I’d made to Dixie show. I wanted to step forward. To grab Denise Harford by the throat and let her know what it felt like to have your world ripped open by someone else’s spite.
But I’d promised. Even as every instinct screamed to do the opposite, I took a backwards step.
Denise’s voice chased us. “You’ll regret it.”
Shouldering Harford, Shade made a sound of amusement.“Original.”
I was slower to follow. When he reached the end of the hall, I’d barely moved. Denise’s eyes were still on mine. Then she slammed her palm down on a brass plate mounted to the wall.
A low, ugly wail erupted through the house.
Shade laughed. “Oh good, a panic button. I was hoping for that.”
Arran shook me. “Go.”
Denise stood beside the alarm panel, chin lifted, a queen defending her keep. For one final second, her gaze flicked to her husband. Not in concern, but cold calculation.
Then she smiled.
So badly, I wanted to turn back. Take her like we’d done with her rapist husband. But she could wait.
In time, I would come for every piece of her world, and she wouldn’t see until it was already on fire.
Arran growled a warning. Somewhere in the house, a door smacked open, the sound echoing.
At last, I gave up my side of the standoff and ran.
We thundered down the hall to where Shade waited, and Arran shoved open the back door. The night punched in. We extracted Terrence while the alarm screamed behind us and lights sprang on in the cottage across the lawn. Someone shouted.
Headlights flared at the front of the property. Security had acted fast. Faster than a callout should be.
We hit the wall, cleared it hard, and sprinted through the trees.
